Welcome to the Canada 150 Edmonton Trivia Contest! Today we’re releasing the next set of 10 questions – Communications in Edmonton. Sets of 10 questions will be released every Friday between now and June 23.

Questions can be answered using this online form and completed forms are entered into two draws. See full contest details, including prizes, in our March 14 blog post.

The growth of the City was affected by a number of factors from population increases because of our boom cycles during economic upturns to the availability of land (sometimes already with a town on it) for purchase or annexation. How successfully the City takes in new people and new land will have an impact on its citizens’ quality of life. Does the transportation infrastructure, the school buildings, and opportunities for work support the new neighbourhoods being added? Can people still get the health care, the opportunities for engaging in the arts and leisure activities or are they isolated? Can the City absorb an influx of new immigrants again – as it has so many times in the past?

EA-10-2899 Ox Train c. 1884

Many people know why prairie towns have such wide main roads – but initially it was to accommodate a long ox- or mule train turning around. Often the wagons or carts would be hitched together and the animals yoked together at the front in a string. To turn them around took a wide road – about the width of Jasper or Whyte Avenue.

Over time Edmonton has grown by leaps and bounds – and then had years of little or no increase in size or population. In the 1980s the City planned a ring road to to make getting around easier. The Anthony Henday Drive was named in 1988 by the City’s Naming Committee but by the time it was completed in 2016 it no longer contained the City. Multiple neighbourhoods had sprung up on the outskirts of the road in all directions as the City underwent a huge growth spurt and urban sprawl – which has in turn sparked a new City initiative to increase internal neighbourhood density.

4. Edmonton’s population decreased between 1914 and 1919. What caused this exodus from Edmonton?

A. First World War
B. Spanish Flu epidemic
C. Economic depressionD. All of the above

EA-10-2768 Armistice Day Parade During Flu Epidemic November 11, 1918. People in the crowd are wearing masks to protect themselves from the Spanish Flu.

5. Which significant landmark led to the amalgamation of the two cities of Edmonton and Strathcona?

EA-10-1864 High Level Bridge 1950 Looking south from the Legislature Grounds towards the University of Alberta.

6. Which south eastern neighbourhood was the first development planned and developed by City Planners?

A. Mill Woods
B. Castle Downs
C. Terwillegar
D. Summerside

For the most part private developers have driven the subdivision and creation of neighbourhoods. The Mill Woods experiment allowed “the experts”, Edmonton’s own planning department, to conceptualize and build an affordable, walkable, self contained neighbourhood in an era of housing shortages and rising real estate prices.

7. When did the first train from Calgary arrive in Strathcona?

A. 1890B. 1891
C. 1892
D. 1893

8. In what year did the first Chinese immigrants arrive in Edmonton?

A. 1858B. 1892
C. 1928
D. 1947

9. Edmonton’s population boomed again in the 1950’s. What was the cause of this?

A. European immigration after the Second World War
B. The discovery of oil increased the oil industry
C. Post war world-wide baby boomD. All of the above